Attack on Titan OP 4

Introduction

Attack on Titan is an anime known for its explosive OPs (both animation and music wise), but the fourth OP, which plays during the first cour of season three, doesn’t really fit in. While anyone who has watched the series probably knows the first three OPs, I’ll still talk about them briefly for newcomers.

Guren no Yumiya by Linked Horizon is the first OP of the series. For those who aren’t aware, we generally refer to OPs either numbered by their airing order, or simply with the name of the song which they feature.

Since this is the first OP, we get shots of the various main characters as a way to introduce them to the viewer, but there are also plenty of the titular titans, and action scenes depicting battles between the titans and the military. Finally, the “primary” antagonist of this cour, the Colossal Titan, is shown.

Jiyū no Tsubasa, again by Linked Horizon, is the second OP of the series, as well as the OP for the second cour of season one. While the first cour of the series mainly focused on the fall of the walls and the attack of the titans, the second cour focuses on taking the fight back to the titans.

A large portion of this cour takes place on horseback outside the inner walls, in what has become titan territory. Because of this, we see a lot of scenes depicting expeditions and battles on horseback. We also get a glimpse of the primary antagonist of the cour, the Female Titan.

Shinzō o Sasageyo!, also by Linked Horizon, is the third OP of the series, and only OP of the second season. The first season primarily focused on our three main characters, but the second season shifts a large amount of screen time to the supporting cast, and this OP reflects that.

We also see plenty of titans, and both of the primary antagonists of the season. The Armored titan, although present briefly in season one, truly makes its entry into the series during this season, but the Beast Titan is the true main antagonist of the season.

Red Swan

Then, after these three action packed OPs, we get OP 4, the first OP from season three, Red Swan by Yoshiki featuring HYDE. (*Disclaimer: the video of this OP featured below may be removed since the one originally uploaded by Funimation was removed.)

To start with, the song is no longer an anthem about rising up and fighting back against the titans, but rather a mellow song most likely about someone dying (hopefully Armin). This song alone, other than the fact that it’s not by Linked Horizon, is a drastic break from the other OPs.

Another major change is the lack of any action scenes and titans. That’s right, there are no titans shown in the fourth OP of Attack on Titan. That’s almost like if Naruto had an OP that didn’t show ninjas. However, we do still get to see the primary antagonist of this cour, Kenny the Ripper.

As previously mentioned, the first season focuses on the three main characters, and the second focuses more on the supporting cast, but this third season is going to shift the focus to Captain Levi, which makes sense since Kenny is someone from his past.

So although we don’t see any titans, that may simply be because the titans won’t be the main focus of this cour. It’s quite possible there won’t be any real interaction with the titans during this cour, and the scout regiment will focus on fighting Kenny and his group, but as someone who doesn’t read the manga, I have no idea.

However, the manga appears to be the only thing saving this OP. I, for one, hate this OP and can’t wait for the cour to be over just so I can hopefully go back to not skipping Attack on Titan OPs, but manga readers insist that this OP is great and that we’ll all understand in the end.

I’m not convinced.

I’m not saying that this is a bad OP in general, I’m saying it’s a bad OP for this particular series. Attack on Titan is an action anime, and this OP replaced all the action scenes with scenes of the characters looking forlornly at the sky, or scenes of the characters as children.

It’s an anime known for its explosive, anthem OPs, and yet it no longer has that either.

Conclusion

Maybe I’m just pessimistic, but I don’t really see any redeeming qualities of this new OP and I can’t see any way I’ll change my opinion of it by the end of the cour.

What are your thoughts on the new OP compared to the previous three? Do you like it? Hate it? What do you think it says about the direction the story is likely to take? Leave a comment below to let me know.